


Questions

by zycroft



Category: Ashes to Ashes, Life on Mars (UK)
Genre: F/M, M/M, Masturbation, Speculation, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2012-02-05
Updated: 2012-02-05
Packaged: 2017-10-30 16:20:30
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,617
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/333673
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/zycroft/pseuds/zycroft
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>In her second year as Gene's DI, Alex has a lot of questions about Sam. And about Gene.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Questions

Gene wasn’t sexy. His misogyny wasn’t charming, his bigotry wasn’t an oddly endearing throwback to her childhood, and the stench of scotch mixed with Old Spice pouring off him didn’t cause a tingling to run up her spine.

Most definitely not.

Sam had done what he could to hide his attraction to the man, but years of studying and reading people let Alex see right through him. She figured that, like many men who realise they’re bi-curious after their 35th birthday, he was confused and ashamed. She had talked with enough men like him to have pretty clear idea of the thoughts running through his head; the confusion, the shame, the thrill, the over-the-top fantasies they’d never live even if given the chance.

Now that she’s met Hunt, she understands Sam’s shame and confusion a lot better. DCI Tyler was hardly the kind of man who’d get turned on by another man physically overpowering him. If he’d had an interest in men, he’d go out on a few dates until he felt comfortable brining one home, same as he would with any woman he dated. If he’d started to feel that way while he was in a relationship, he’d tell his girlfriend about it. Alex smiled as she thought of how Maya would react to that. She’d probably encourage him to explore his curiosity. Hell, she’d probably want to watch.

But with Hunt, all bets were off. Already shaken and confused, Sam was looking for comfort when he landed in 1973. And there’s no denying that Gene’s rough words and actions are motivated by affection when it comes to his people. That affection, no matter how violent, was all Sam could get and it would be far more worrying if he hadn’t developed an attraction to Gene.

Alex didn’t know what happened to him when he returned from 2007, after their few short talks and his lengthy report on his experience, but by all accounts he and Annie had been very happy together. Piecing it all together was difficult and there were blanks she’d never be able to fill, but it seemed that once Sam committed suicide, he returned to the same day, if not minute, that he’d left his coma-world. He and Annie started dating within days of the showdown in the tunnel, and they’d remained together until his death.

His death.

How many times could the man die? Did he die at all? Gene wouldn’t talk about him and efforts to push him brought out a venom he usually reserved for nonces. It wasn’t the kind of verbal abuse that made her feel loved; it was the kind that reminded her how alone and lost she was here in 1982.

Why wouldn’t Gene talk about him? Had he killed him? Or was it shame? Maybe Sam wasn’t the only one confused about his feelings for another man. Had something happened between them? A kiss? A cuddle? Something more? Sam admitted in his report that he’d gotten an erection on more than one occasion when Gene manhandled him. Tight clothes, close proximity…maybe Gene had felt it. For a drunken bigot, he was remarkably perceptive. He might have felt or seen Sam’s erection, or he could have just sensed a change in the man, smelt the subtle shift of energy and pheromones in the air. He’d never said anything, at least nothing Sam admitted to in his report, but what about after? After Sam jumped from the roof and apparently returned to 1974?

Gene had called Sam a poof too many times for Sam to count. He’d called him Dorothy and Nancy in what sounded like the same way he called her Bolly. An insult on anyone else’s lips, it was a term of endearment coming from DCI Hunt.

He didn’t get rough with Alex the way he did with Sam, but his ill-treatment of her had the same effect it had had on Sam. Could Gene sense it from her? Could he guess that it made her heart rate kick up and her body to flush with that almost-but-not-quite hint of arousal? Arousal that had blossomed on more than one occasion to a point where she’d brought home some random fuck and worked out her frustration? Or, when she’d tired of that, that she’d mail-ordered a “personal massager” she’d nicknamed The Gene Genie?

And God, how embarrassing that had been! Where were the stores with their shelves lined with vibrators and dildos in ever shape, size, and colour imaginable? This thing was rather disappointing when she’d opened the plain brown packaging that all but screamed “SEX TOY!” to any who saw it. But the first time she used it, the first time she slid it inside herself, the name came to her and she couldn’t rid herself of the shame she felt when she looked at it and remembered the times she’d imagined Gene above her as she’d worked it in and out. She cursed herself for fantasising about the man. He was loud, obnoxious, slovenly, and small-minded. Nothing appealing about him at all.

Except maybe his eyes.

Sam had mentioned them, said they appeared green in the dirty institutional paint job of their station. He said he’d been there a few months before he realised Hunt’s eyes were actually blue. Now it’s the 80s and bright white walls with glaring fluorescents show off the sparkling blue that men and women alike would kill to have.

Eyes that spoke of things the man himself would never say. His friendship with Ray, his fatherly affection for Chris and Shaz, his…what did he feel for Alex? Tenderness. She could see that plainly, just wasn’t sure how to interpret it. Couldn’t trust that what she was seeing wasn’t a reflection of her own thoughts and desires, wasn’t merely wishful thinking.

His eyes went hard and cold when she brought up Sam but it clearly was a reaction to having someone butt in, someone force him to remember things he wasn’t willing to share. A reaction not to the man he’d known, but to his loss of him and the intrusion of An Outsider into that loss. She’d caught him looking at Sam’s obituary once and painted on his face with the pain of loss was genuine admiration and exasperated affection. She could relate to that; Sam seemed to make everyone he met feel that way about him.

She was sad when she’d learned he jumped off the roof of the precinct, but not particularly surprised. At the time, she’d thought his experiences in 1973 and 74 were his comatose brain’s way of coping with the physical and mental trauma of his real life. Still wasn’t convinced that wasn’t the case. But whatever it was, he was clearly happier in Hunt’s world than he was in his own and coming back to it was painful for him. He missed his life as DI Tyler in 1974 CID and returning as DCI Tyler to 2007, attending meetings about hearts and minds and forensic procedure and stemming the flow of narcotics by using CIs and surveillance would have been a hell of a sad shock to him. Did he know he’d return to 1974? Or was he just trying to end it all? Alex can never be sure.

Gene won’t talk about that day any more than he’ll talk about Sam’s death in 1980. The more Alex pries, the more she’s convinced that Gene either killed Sam or he slept with him. Would Annie know? Could Annie hold the key o the mystery? And would she share it? From Sam’s account, she sounded like a very progressive young woman who might be as encouraging as she imagined Maya would be in Sam exploring a homosexual encounter.

Gene’s homophobia was loud and smacked of too much protestation. He’d been in National Service and homosexual behaviour amongst heterosexual men was common, if unmentioned and contemptible. A means to an end, as Gene might say (though not about that).

Gene is a born top. Sexuality doesn’t matter; he’d be the dominate and driving person in any sexual encounter. She could easily imagine him using another man for sex, either getting a handjob or blowjob, or even fucking another man. But he’d never reverse the roles, likely viewing them as soft or womanly. Faggoty, as he’d probably say.

Would Sam have done it? Would his confused attraction and first man-crush have led him to wrapping his hand around Gene’s cock? Taking it in his mouth? If Gene had roughly bent him over the desk in his office and pulled Sam’s trousers down, would he have let him? Would he offer up token resistance in an effort to cling on to the small bit of manhood he was perceived to have in an era to which he didn’t belong? Would he fight in earnest, thrashing his much smaller body against the powerhouse that Gene Hunt was in comparison? Or would he thrash in another way, writhe in agonising pleasure as Gene roughly kicked apart his legs and pushed his way inside him?

The image of Gene pawing at Sam’s trim frame with his big, meaty hands, of Sam sweating and cursing and bucking as Gene pushed and pummeled his way inside him for the first time was too much for Alex. She could see Sam’s face screwed up in pain, or maybe pleasure, or maybe fear; they’d all look remarkably alike. No matter his reaction, Gene would say the same things, call Sam a poof and tell him to shut up and take it like a man and a hundred other clichés that had no right to be so goddamn sexy.

Just like Gene himself.


End file.
